Judge voids seizure of WNC properties

Owners of WNC land caught up in Bailey fraud case

9:50 PM,
Mar. 15, 2013

Written by

Clarke Morrison

A judge voided the government's seizure of Western North Carolina properties worth millions of dollars and in his ruling chastised federal prosecutors for engaging in "absurd contortions" of forfeiture law.

The U.S. Attorney's Office maintained the seizures were valid because money used to buy the properties was mixed with the proceeds of crimes committed by James W. "Bill" Bailey Jr.

But in a sharply worded rebuke, Judge Martin Reidinger sided with about 30 property owners who contended in court filings that the government far overreached its bounds in seeking forfeiture of the ...